Level 7 Strategic Change Management Report: Sainsbury's Analysis

This report delves into the intricacies of change management, using Sainsbury's as a case study to illustrate key concepts. It begins by introducing the company and its market position, then analyzes various change management factors, including internal and external influences. The report examines the application of Kotter's 8-step change model, focusing on creating urgency, building coalitions, developing a vision, communication, removing obstacles, and setting short-term goals. It further explores the relationship between leadership and change agents, evaluates the effectiveness of change agents, and assesses change theories, tools, and techniques. The report also addresses the relationship between management disciplines and organizational change, and the role of various business departments in change management, providing a comprehensive analysis of strategic change implementation.

Running head - CHANGE MANAGEMENT
Change management
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author’s note

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Table of Contents
Introduction....................................................................................................................2
Discussion......................................................................................................................2
Creating an urgency sense at Sainsbury’s..................................................................3
Building Coalition......................................................................................................7
Formation of Vision.................................................................................................10
Communicating the Vision......................................................................................11
Removing the Obstacles...........................................................................................12
Short Term Goals.....................................................................................................13
Task 2.......................................................................................................................15
Relationship between leadership and change agents...............................................15
Effectiveness of change agents................................................................................15
Evaluate change theories, tools and techniques.......................................................16
Relationship between management disciplines and effective organizational change
..............................................................................................................................................17
Role of various business departments within change management.........................17
References................................................................................................................19

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Introduction
Sainsbury’s is the name that is famous around the world. The brand is the second
largest supermarket chain in the whole of the United Kingdom. The organization has a
market share equivalent to 16.9 percent in the supermarket chain (Bailey and Alexander
2017). The organization was founded in the year of 1869. The founder John James Sainsbury,
by whose name the empire was started, open with just a single shop at the Drury Lane at
London. From there till 1922, the organization have achieved the name of becoming the
second largest retailer of products of groceries. The organization started off like being the
normal retail store. However by 1922, it has become the early adopter for providing self-
service retailing in the whole of the United Kingdom. The organization have had their heyday
in between the year of 1980-1995 (Alexander 2015).
After that, the organization have was taken over by Tesco for becoming one of the
leaders in the supermarket field. Thus, after the down fall in the year of 2004, Sainsbury’s
have gone through many change in their strategies and other organizational factors (Woo and
Lee 2018). The following case would be discussing about the various change management
factors that have helped in enacting a organizational change and a the necessary evaluation of
many organizational factors such as internal and external factors, building a coalition,
developing a broader strategies and goals, tools for implementing the plans, removing the
obstacles by identifying potential resistances and creating SMART goals (Hayes 2018).
Discussion
In the following report, the change management would be analyzed implemented by
the use of Kotter’s 8 step guidance (Doppelt 2017). There would be use of the first six steps
from 8 total step that is discussed by Kotter. The first six step includes – creation of urgency
in the organization, formation of powerful coalitions for guiding, development of strategic

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plans and vision for the organization, communication in the organization regarding the vision
and spreading the aim of the vision among the employees of the organization, removing all
the resistances and obstacles in the implementation of the strategic plan and finally, creating
shirt term wins and SMART goals.
Creating an urgency sense at Sainsbury’s
A sense of urgency is classified as the change that is needed to enact in the
organization at the time of crisis or managing the strategic implementation by leaders as the
agent of change (Frankland et al. 2015) any critical stakeholders. The critical stakeholders of
the organization composes the apex management, employees, investors and customers. They
all compose as the critical stakeholders at Sainsbury’s. Another scenario at which Sainsbury
could use the sense of urgency would be when the leaders at Sainsbury wants to explain the
importance of making the speedy changes in the existing condition of the organization. At the
time of creating a sense of urgency in the organization, leaders are supposed to alert the
organization about the changes that is supposed to occur at the organization so that the
employees are aware of the fact that new changes are being enacted in the organization and
the organization is also aware the process of the change (Cameron and Green 2015).
There are many factors that includes in the organizational change factors. An
organization is composed of both internal and external factors. Analyzing these factors helps
in making the environment of the organization ready for processing the new and modified
change plan in the organization and the implementation of better strategic plans for
conducting business.
There are many internal factors that affects an organization and thus is needed to be
analyzed for the implementation of a change plan. Factors that compose the internal parts at
Sainsbury’s are – the mission of the organization, the leadership of the organization,

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communication mediums and channels in the organization, the structure of the organization,
and the learnings of the organizations (Hornstein 2015).
The mission statement at the Sainsbury’s explains that the organization id responsible
for creating a better environment for the customers by making the brand the first choice for
the customers at selecting food and delivery products. They plan to deliver their motto by
creating a sustainable and quality service with competitive cost by working in a faster,
simpler way and all together (Lewis, Cantore and Passmore 2016). The mission of
Sainsbury’s needs to be upgraded as just only focusing on delivering quality products would
not be enough by creating a sustainable environment for the business chain and working in s
more simpler and faster way. The organization needs to understand that what are their
customers’ needs and what products they want from them. The choice of people is different
for each individual and their analysis of quality is also very different from one another. Thus,
Sainsbury needs to analyze the quality bar for each separate individual.
Leadership of Sainsbury’s were transferred to Tesco’s after the year 1995 to make
them a global leader in the grocery market. Leadership falls under the internal factors as it
helps as leadership is an important quality that helps in success of the organization. Quality
leader helps in creating an environment that helps the organization to gain success. Therefore,
great leaders are required for Sainsbury’s to access the organization and achieving the correct
success plans (Lozano, Nummert and Ceulemans 2016).
Communication inside an organization is important. There should be different types
of communication channel in the organization that would help in creating a better work
environment at Sainsbury’s. Communication would help in discussing the results in the
organization (Booth 2015). The flow of communication is from the higher level to the lower
level. Thus, it would be important for Sainsbury’s to maintain this flow of communication in

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the hierarchical structure at the organization. Sometimes, there are organizations that have
quality structure but have a flawed communication channels. Thus. It is necessary for
Sainsbury’s to maintain a good flow of communication from higher level to the lower level to
achieve success while conducting business in the grocery market worldwide by discussing
their results and strategic plans among the employees and the management of the
organization (Lines et al. 2015).
Structure in the organization is one of the most important aspect that is needed to
analyzed is there should be implementation of change of plans and management at any
organization. At Sainsbury’s, the organizational structure is rigid. But, the structure of the
organization that is operational at Sainsbury’s is of hierarchical structure. (Ceulemans,
Lozano and Alonso-Almeida 2015). There are many layers at the organization from the top to
the bottom of management. There are boards of members, apex management, employees,
both at senior ad lower level and many more. Burt, if change is to be implemented at
Sainsbury’s for more efficiency, it could be proposed that a flat structure is to be applied at
the organization. Flat structure have very few hierarchy levels in them that helps in accessing
and making it more efficient. The advantage over flat structure over hierarchical structure is
that having fewer levels would help in creating a better performance for Sainsbury’s at the
global market.
Learning is also an important internal factor that helps in analyzing change in an
organization. Learning is an important fundamental to gain knowledge for human beings.
Learning is accounted both directly and indirectly for the success of any organization. It helps
in understanding the flaws and weakness in the organization that would eventually make the
organization one step closer to a broader aspect (Bradley 2016). There have been
advancement in the technological field in the recent years. These technologies have been
helping organizations in making a betterment in the field by making the work easy, fast and

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perfect. Thus, Sainsbury’s should learn the technological advancement that would help them
in building a better work environment and a structure that would eventually bring success to
them. They should be needing to find a way that would encourage more innovations and
motivate their employees for taking initiative for growth and prosper.
External factors are also responsible for creating the sense of urgency among the
organization. It is analyzed to understand the factors that participates in enacting change in
the organization (Altamony et al. 2016). The factors that are responsible for the external
change are – political, economic, social and technological factor. Since Sainsbury’s is United
Kingdom originated organization, the external factor analysis that is to be done is of the
country itself.
Pestle or PEST analysis is a tool that is used by organizations to analyze and
understand the market in which it would be conducting business. The analysis consist of
factors such as political, economic, social and technological (Van Rossum et al. 2016).
Political Factor – The United Kingdom consist of four countries. These countries are
Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England. This is considered to be one of the most
power countries in the world. It have an excellent political stability that is sustainable and
durable for any market of business. All factors taken in consideration, Brexit have always
created some of the uncertainties in the country. The United Kingdom have always been a
popular destination for many foreign direct investments. There have been huge investments
from many foreign countries in every market (Alvesson and Sveningsson 2015). Thus, it
would be beneficial for Sainsbury’s that would be funded with essential and sufficient
amount of funding for their operations. The grocery industries based on the United Kingdom
have huge of interest at overseas.

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Economic factor – The economic landscape for the country is important. The United
Kingdom is considered as the 5th largest economy by GDP. Although the country have faced
some challenges and at the end of 2008 for recession. However it was controlled by the
government by taking necessary measures. The country have also faced a hike in the process
of commodities at the end of 2017 (Kaufman 2017). The prices at the grocery shop rose high
as the price of imported good increased and the value of pound had decreased. Although
prices of groceries had increased, wages of workers did not increased.
Social Factor – The United Kingdom is a great market for consumers. The population the
country have been increasing exponentially and by the end of 2039 is expected to reach 74
million. This has been implicated at both the labour market and the health care system. The
United Kingdom has factually been prejudiced by the concept of social status. However, the
population is multiethnic (Keenan 2015). Over the years, corporations have established a
variety of new merchandises and markets to supply for the needs of diverse races and
religious conviction. There are still many occasions out there for organization’s to discover.
Technological factor – The technological factor is also an important aspect for promoting
change in the countries at the organizations in it. There have been many occasion where it is
found that the organization the countries have not been able to access success due to the fact
that the country is unavailable for providing a successful environment of technological
advancement (Hornstein 2015). The advancement in the technological infrastructure have
always been important as it have offered entrepreneurs that opportunity to illustrate their
ideas and concert them into reality.
Building Coalition
Change is inevitable. One day or another change would be implemented. But there are
some employees in the organization that would not be pleased with the changes that is to be

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implemented in the organization. They believe the organization is perfect from their point of
view. However, they are needed to be convinced that change is necessary. Thus, Sainsbury’s
would be needing a strong leadership that would help in convincing the people that change is
necessary. This is how, coalition is built in the organization for managing and implementing
change. For building coalition and leading change in the organization, the leaders in the
organizations would be needing to bring in influential people that who has power for variety
of sources (Teixeira, Gregory and Austin 2017). These sources that these people would have
includes job title, the status that is enjoyed by them, their expertise and also political
importance. For building coalition, there should be analysis of the change agents and their
characteristics.
A change agent is considered to be a person that exists either inside the organization
or outside the organization. They attribute their potential in transforming the organization in a
better one by focusing on some important matter such as effectiveness of organization, their
improvement and their development. They mostly tries to focus their effort on effecting the
changing the technologies, structure and tasks their effectiveness on interpersonal and
managing group relationship in that particular organization. The prior focus is kept on
organizational people and their interaction (Pollack, and Pollack 2015).
The identification of the change agents are done one the basis of experience,
expertise, access, characteristic, enthusiasm, resistance, organizational knowledge and
influence.
Experience is necessary for changing anything. As new employees does not have
knowledge of working and operation of the organization. Thus, they are not fit to propose any
change plans or suggestions in the organization. The organizational experience would help
them in any kind of implementation of plans and processes that would initiate any

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improvements on the organization. Mainly employees with great experiences are entitled for
creating and implementing change in the organization. Thus, at Sainsbury’s, the employees
with greater experience is responsible for bring change in the organization and these people
could be included to be potential change agents.
People with different expertise are also sometimes entitled to be change agents.
Organization should be composed of many employees that have various expertise in many
field. This experts are entitled to make the organization invest into many sectors that were not
their previous domain. Depending on these expert employees in the organization, change is
brought in the organization. These experts are helps in gaining knowledge to the organization
which would later be conveyed to the other employees in the organization so that it could be
applied. Different experts could belong from different sectors that would Sainsbury’s
business operation. These experts at Sainsbury’s would be helping to implement changes in
the organization (Bejinariu et al. 2017).
Accessing at different parts and sectors of the organization is also important for
enacting any change in the organization. Managers and other higher level employees at the
apex level of the management in an organization have access to different sectors of the
organization that helps them in understanding the results of the organization and how
strategic plans are needed to be assessed. Thus, organizational access is important for bring
change in the organization and people having access are identified as agents of change.
People with high enthusiasm is also identified as agents for changes. People with high
enthusiasm encourages people to take their work more seriously and helps them in making
more progress. They are entitled to bring change in the organization by creating a better
environment for the employees.

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Organizational knowledge is considered to be the key point for enacting change in the
organization. People with high organizational knowledge is responsible for bringing change
in the organization and create new ideas that could help the organization for growth. Thus,
employees at Sainsbury’s who have high knowledge about the organization could be
considered to be change agents.
People with influence is also responsible for creating environment that would impact
on change plans of the organization. Influence on people important for creating environment
that could make the employees feel comfortable while working in the organization. Members
of the organization in the higher level of management influence lower level employees for
working and providing support to their organization. Their influence also matter as they are
looked upon by the lower level employees for creating image and motivate them for working
(Small et al. 2016). The influence of these higher level employees helps in convincing the
board of members for enacting change in the organization. Thus, employees that have better
influence at Sainsbury’s could be identified as one of the change agents.
Formation of Vision
The previous goals of Sainsbury was quite similar as that for their mission. They were
oriented for producing quality products for the customers and create a chain of supply in a
smart way (Chappell et al. 2016).
After the change management, there have been a change in the organizational goals at
Sainsbury’s. They have set their goals that is closer for being more customer oriented. The
organization is trying to understand and analyze the needs of their customers and producing
product according their preferences. They have also taken the initiative to create more
possible scopes for their customers to analyze the products that would be needing by getting
easy and smart delivery.

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 Prior goal would be creating sustainable products according to the choices of
customers
 Creating new ways for delivery that is both smart and convenient in way.
 Making the brand the first choice for the people at the United Kingdom.
The organizational vision would also change after the implementation of the change
management plan. The new vision of Sainsbury would be making the organization the
largest chain of supermarket of grocery retails in the whole of the United Kingdom. They
have also planned to invest in differing sectors by getting access of retails like clothing
and furniture and other household accessories apart from just groceries. The organization
also plans to open retails around the globe by going globalization (Baloh, Zhu and Ward
2018).
The organization have also planned to create a changed strategic plan that would fit
with the change management. The changed strategic plan is a broader image of the
previous strategic plan.
Sainsbury needs to engage mote with the various stakeholders that would make them
discuss more about the exchange or bargaining structure of the organization. This would
help them is creating a more secured and incremented form of strategic plan that would
be designed composing with the core objectives that would help in managing the
environment of business around the organization. They could create a more concrete form
of background that would help them in creating more secured form of business and make
a positive impact of the people. Thus, this would also help in influencing the people and
earning more revenue. Thus, this strategic plan would help in achieving the desired profit
margin by the officials at Sainsbury’s.